How to Make a Hunting Knife

Image Gallery Excerpted with permission from Step-by-Step Knifemaking: You Can Do It!by David Boye, copyright© 1977 by the author. A Rodale Press book. COURTESY RODALE PRESS

Select Your Steel

Since used saw blades, whether crosscut, buzz or hand, are fairly consistent metallurgically, come in a variety of ideal sizes and thicknesses, and are very easy to obtain, I suggest that you tap this wonderful source of steel (especially if you're a beginner) for any knives you want to make in your own home workshop.

I use carbon saw-blade stock which I scrounge from lumber mills and scrap yards. These blades are made from top quality carbon steel and are ideal for knifemaking.

The perfect knife blade should be hard so that it won't become dented and scratched, tough enough so it won't bend or break, and wear-resistant enough to hold a good edge. (If the blade is too hard and too wear resistant, of course, it'll be difficult to sharpen. Use some judgment.) The perfect blade should also be made of stainless steel so it won't darken or rust.

Design the Blade

Knives come in all shapes and sizes. Look around. Test and compare various designs. Then, once you've decided upon a shape and size that suits you best, draw a full-scale outline of the blade (including tang!) on a piece of cardboard or poster board.

Cut the silhouette out with a razor knife or small band saw. Pretend it's a real knife. Hold it. Heft it. How does it feel? Keep the outline around for a day or two and see if its shape "wears well" with you. If not, redesign the blade as many times as necessary while it's still in cardboard form. Only after you're completely sure that you're satisfied with the proposed blade should the template be used to trace the outline onto a piece of steel.

Design the Handle

There are two basic kinds of knife handles: [1] scale or slab, in which two pieces of wood or other material are used to sandwich the blade's tang (or shank), and [2] one-piece, which, just as the name implies, uses a single piece of material to surround the tang.

As you design your knife blade, then, consider the type of handle the finished tool will have. If it will be a "full-tang scale handle," for instance, the silhouette of the shank will, of course, be the same as the silhouette of the whole handle. In the case of a "one-piece handle with tang embedded," it will not.

Make the Blade

Once you've chosen your knife's shape and size, have it designed and have the steel for its blade in hand, you're ready to cut out the blade's rough shape with a cutting torch or band saw.

A torch does this job quite nicely and may be easier to find than a band saw which will cut through hard steel. Furthermore, a torch is usually faster than a band saw (especially when you're knocking out production runs of blanks from large pieces of stock). For these reasons, I always prefer to use a torch when I'm roughing knife blades out of old carbon steel saw blades.